Are you a King or Queen?
Imagine that you were a King or Queen a few hundred years ago. What would that be like? Certainly, it would be nice to have servants attending to all your wishes. You would be wealthy and have no financial concerns of any kind. Sounds great?
But let’s look at the other side of being a royal many years ago and also examine the life of “commoners” like us today. .
This morning, most of us took a shower or bath. If we wanted the water to be a little warmer or cooler, we simply turned a knob. If we needed more light in the bathroom, we flipped a switch. To go to work, we climbed into our car and turned a key. As we drove, we could maneuver the climate to suit us by turning a knob. The local drive-through provided hot coffee or breakfast in exchange for a few dollars and a minute of our time. Once at work, we rose up to our floor by pushing another button; no climbing stairs. And so on. Our day, while working or at leisure, pretty much was comprised of button-pushing, knob-turning, and switch-flipping. In fact, our lives have become so convenience-saturated that the health conscious among us pay fees to fitness clubs to “work out.”
While many people who live on our planet do not have the conveniences described above, most Americans do. Even many of the poor and unemployed Americans have TVs, cell phones, and HVAC. Do you know anyone who drives a car without air conditioning or cruise control?
A king or queen in medieval times had to wait for strawberries to be “in season” in order to enjoy a fruit salad. However majestic their castle might have been, it was also drafty, so blankets were needed. And in the summer, only sunset would offer respite from the heat. A trip from one end of the kingdom to the other probably involve days in a bumpy carriage rather than an hour or two on a jet. A king needed to go to a concert hall to hear a symphony; we simply throw in a disc or turn on the radio or cable. While many of us go into “video withdrawal” if the cable goes out for an hour, television was beyond the wildest imagination two centuries ago.
The message in today’s newsletter is to recognize how well all of us live today. Realize the incredible technical process that is represented by your ability to read this via the internet. And for me to be able to communicate with you simply by typing this on a laptop – no printing press, newsstand or delivery boy involved.
Certainly, there is more to human happiness than technical comforts. Relationship issues and challenges probably haven’t changed much over the years. If we are unhappy, it may be because we are experiencing some relationship problem. But when it comes to overall lifestyle and personal comfort, it is important to appreciate the luxurious lifestyle we are living, thanks to the technologies alluded to earlier in this letter. As the snowman suggests to us, we may not be thinking clearly about something if we are miserable .
How many of us envy those in first class while we take the miracle of air travel for granted? Are we frustrated when the local supermarket is out of a favorite flavor or size of some item, while we overlook the wonders that modern agriculture, refrigeration, and transportation provide via the neighborhood grocery store?
Personally, on a list of daily blessings, I have trouble rating anything above indoor plumbing!
So as all of us appropriately move into 2012 with resolutions for personal improvement and accomplishment, it is also important that we look around us and “count our blessings.” We do truly live like kings and queens, if we only take a moment to notice what is around us and realize how “regally” we all live.